1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to soft switches which can be used with existing household wiring arrangements to effect control from any other number of separate stations. The contents of the above Patents and Patent Applications are incorporated herein by reference for the purpose of providing background information.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The concept of soft switching, i.e., gradual "turn-on" and "turn-off," has been disclosed in previous Patents by one of the Inventors (e.g. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,898,516 and 4,008,416) and at least one circuit has been proposed by the same Inventors for producing a momentary contact soft switch.
These prior art circuits, however, cannot be used to effect multiple station control, unless the facility is already specially wired for standard three way operation, i.e., in addition to the wire between each station and one of the lamp terminals, both sides of the AC line must be brought to each of the stations. Thus, in situations where one wishes, for example to operate a table lamp which is plugged into an outlet controlled by a single wall switch, one would have to add additional household wiring to be able to turn the lamp "on" or "off" from the wall switch or the lamp switch. Moreover, if one wished to control a lamp from more than two locations using momentary contact switches, an arrangement like that shown in application Ser. No. 768,544, would not suffice even where the existing wiring was adequate) because such a configuration is inherently limited to a maximum of two stations.
Accordingly, a primary object of the invention is to provide a momentary contact light switch which can be used to replace a conventional mechanical toggle switch at any number of control stations.
Another object of the invention is to provide a momentary contact light switch which does not utilize relays or other mechanical devices to effect a change in the state of the system.
A further object of the invention is to provide a switch which can be added to any existing wiring configuration to effect control from more than one station.
Another object of the invention is to provide a momentary contact switch which can be wired in series with any number of similar momentary contact switches so that each switch is capable of controlling the application of power to a load independent of every other switch.
Another object of the invention is to provide a momentary contact switch which will eliminate the need for 3-way (or more) household wiring arrangements to effect control of a light from a plurality of separate stations.
Another object of the invention is to provide a gradual change in the amount of AC power applied to a load following the depression of any one of a plurality of series connected momentary contact switches.
Another object of the invention is to provide gradual turn-on and turn-off of a lamp from one or more momentary contact switches which are series interconnected with the lamp and AC power source.
Other objects and advantages of the present invention will be obvious from the detailed description of a preferred embodiment given hereinbelow.